Scotland Yard cuffs teens for role in cybercrime forum

Two teenagers have been arrested for their alleged involvement in the world's largest English-language cybercrime forum.

The pair were detained by appointment in central London on Wednesday by the Police Central e-Crime Unit (PCeU), a national unit based at Scotland Yard.

An eight-month investigation into the forum, which hasn't been named, found it had almost 8,000 members who traded malware, cybercrime tutorials and stolen banking information.

The cybercrime tools for sale included the ZeuS Trojan and data stolen from machines it has already infected. Detectives have so far recovered 65,000 credit card numbers from the forum.

The two males, aged 17 and 18, were arrested on suspicion of encouraging or assisting crime, unauthorised access under the Computer Misuse Act and conspiracy to commit fraud. The have been bailed pending further investigations.

The PCeU's Detective Chief Inspector Terry Wilson said: "Today's arrests are an example of our increasing effort to combat online criminality and reduce national harm to the UK economy and public."

The unit has already had its budget slashed as part of Home Office cuts. ®